


The Light of the Moon

by narcissablaxk



Category: Turn (TV 2014)
Genre: Arnold is a dick, Homophobia ahoy, M/M, Protective!George, Read at Your Own Risk, hurt!Ben
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-12
Updated: 2016-08-12
Packaged: 2018-08-08 09:00:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,398
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7751425
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/narcissablaxk/pseuds/narcissablaxk
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Arnold, now completely on the British side, has decided that Benjamin Tallmadge is at the top of his list.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Light of the Moon

Benedict Arnold had always been his friend. George Washington scrambled through the snow, his steps undignified, his cloak tangling between his legs. He wrenched it off and left it behind. That wasn’t important. What was important was finding Ben. 

Sweet, innocent Benjamin Tallmadge, driven by honor and righteousness, and he had been put in danger. By him. George wiped furiously at the tears gathering at the corners of his eyes as he thought about it. Just the cold, he defended his show of emotion. It was just the cold. 

News of Benedict Arnold’s betrayal had been – a blow to George’s…well, everything. The man had been one of his closest confidantes, someone he trusted utterly. Knowing the man had traded their secrets, their numbers, their plans, for money, for what he thought would be a higher stature at the end of the conflict was repugnant. And knowing that the man still looked him in the eye at the end of the day was enough to make George sick to his stomach. 

But seeing him walk through his tent, all done up in red, was even more nauseating. 

He didn’t even try to hide the colors he wore; George momentarily disregarded him, wondering with a sudden terrifying fierceness how the man had managed to get into camp in the first place – he knew that he had enemies in camp, but ones that regarded him so lowly as to invite a known traitor in enemy uniform into their commanding officer’s tent? 

He would have Benjamin uncover them, he thought confidently as Arnold surveyed the room with his odious and superior sneer. 

“Don’t you have anything to say to me?” Arnold asked. George felt a wave of fury wash over him. How dare he speak to him like that? How dare he act like he was above him? 

“I could have you hanged,” he growled, wondering why he hadn’t called for the order already. 

“Tut tut, George, that’s not what I was looking for,” Arnold, the irritatingly calm man, turned away from him, toward the rolls of maps that George kept in specific cubbies. 

He drew his sword quickly, and the sound of the metal scraping against its sheath was enough to draw Arnold back to him. The other man’s lips turned upward at the sight of George’s sword. 

“I wouldn’t do that, if I were you,” he advised him, his voice still annoyingly calm. “If you do, how will you find your precious little Major?” 

Everything ground to a halt. The pounding in George’s chest filled him with an unsteady dread. Arnold was full on grinning now, showing teeth, waiting for George to ask. 

But he couldn’t bring himself to speak. Arnold’s glee seemed to increase the longer he was silent. “What?” is what he settled on. 

“You think I didn’t know?” Arnold spat, the amusement sliding easily into his short temper. “You think the whole camp doesn’t know about the two of you? The only reason the both of you haven’t been hanged is because they think you’re entitled to fucking anything that walks by. The demigod, George Washington.” 

George couldn’t find enough calm strength in him to speak. 

“You two are fucking disgusting, you know that?” Finally, they had gotten to Arnold’s true demeanor. It almost calmed George a little, to know that his façade of collectiveness was over. “Sodomites.” 

“At least we aren’t traitors,” George said calmly, and the change in Arnold’s behavior was sudden and terrible. The sword tip that George didn’t even remember him drawing was pointed at his throat, his face beet red, his knuckles white around the hilt. 

“I could kill you now.” 

“But you won’t,” George swallowed carefully, feeling his throat work around the tip of the sword. “Why?” 

The sword tip lowered a little as Arnold’s grin returned. “Because, General, if I kill you, who would find Major Tallmadge?” 

Immediately, as though Arnold had driven spurs into him, George was moving toward the tent flap. He didn’t know where he was going, where Ben was likely to be, but it didn’t matter. What mattered was finding him. Even if he had to wander through the woods for hours. 

“Not so fast,” Arnold’s raised voice stopped him just outside the tent. Reluctantly, he stepped back inside. “You’ll never find him like that, General, I thought you were smarter than that.” 

George’s hand, around the hilt of his sword, tightened painfully. The mocking, the teasing, it was all taking too much time. 

“Where is he, then?” he demanded. 

“Even if you find him, even if you save him tonight, Benjamin Tallmadge is number one on my list,” Arnold promised. “And I think even you know what that means.” 

George did know. Arnold, as undignified as he could be, as proud, as vain, as short sighted, was still a deadly man. When he put a man on his list – that man fell. George clenched his jaw tightly, hearing his molars grind together, and took a step closer to his former friend, feeling the sting of the sword tip as it pressed tighter against his skin but didn’t break it. 

“Then I guess that means you’re on mine.” 

“So protective of your little pet,” Arnold growled, baring his teeth like an animal. “Who knew General Washington was capable of such devotion?” 

“Certainly not the man who traded blue for red,” George snapped. “Get on with it. Where is he?” 

Arnold’s eyes had hardened at the mention of his coat color. “I never would have had to trade coats if you and Congress had given me what I deserved!” 

“What you deserve now is an undignified death and an unmarked grave,” George pointed out. “I could give you that.” 

“But then Tallmadge would die. And you could never forgive yourself.” 

George was starting to regret discarding his cloak. He was freezing; he could feel the numbness at the tips of his fingers at toes starting to set in. He would have to find Ben soon. How long had he been out here? What had Arnold done to him? 

The first drop of red in the snow was enough for George to admit to himself that the tears at the corners of his eyes were not from just the cold. He surged ahead through the snow, calling for Ben. 

The boy could not die. He wouldn’t let him. 

He wouldn’t lose someone else. 

He thought of Martha, his Martha, lost while he was at war, and had to suppress a sob that threatened to halt his progress through the snow. Now wasn’t the time to lose himself. 

A larger spot of red, smeared against the frozen trunk of a tree, caught his eye. His breath stuttered in his throat and died. How long ago had that been smeared there? Had Arnold left it as a decoy, ensuring that George couldn’t get to Ben in time? Or had Ben left it there, hoping someone, anyone would save him? 

Ben needing a savior was enough to drive George forward again. 

“Benjamin!” he shouted into the cold, his breath clouding his vision. 

The drops were getting larger, more frequent. George’s breath stopped altogether when he caught sight of a boot that he recognized. Army issue. But where was Ben? Why hadn’t he said anything? 

A large pile of snow had been displaced near one of the larger trees, the smears of blood in it turning it almost a soft pink, its pastel color a little unnerving. George rushed around the trunk of the tree, falling to his knees immediately when he caught sight of a familiar leg. 

He drank in the sight of Ben like he was a man parched for water in the desert, and set to assessing his wounds. The blood he had shed was a lot, but not from a mortal injury. Arnold wouldn’t kill him so quickly – he had said Ben was on his list. 

But his eyes were closed, his breathing shallow, almost nonexistent. 

“Benjamin,” George breathed, touching the boy’s face gently. The blood from the wound in his arm and his thigh seeped deeper into the snow, and George steeled himself and patted him on the cheek. “Benjamin, you have to wake up.” 

The slap did nothing. George felt helplessness settle on his shoulders heavily, and stood on unsteady legs to lift Ben into his arms. If he wouldn’t wake up, then George would carry him out himself. 

It was the least he could do, he thought. It was George’s love that had gotten him into this, that could have gotten him killed. His eyes fell to Ben’s beautiful eyes, closed. What price would he have to pay to see them open? 

The trudge back to camp was a lot longer than George had anticipated. How far had he gone into the woods to find Ben? His legs, already shaking with nerves and the cold, could barely hold him up, and he had to let his mind wander somewhere else just to keep putting one foot in front of the other. 

He let his imagination create his future, in America, with Ben by his side. A stable full of horses, a vineyard. Happiness, contentment that Benjamin certainly had earned. A house full of Benjamin’s friends, filled to the brim with his smile. 

But the cold was creeping in again, and soon, even those thoughts, the picture of the warm Virginia sun, Benjamin’s eyelashes, like spun gold in the early morning, couldn’t keep the pain, the panic at bay any longer. 

“General? General Washington!” Lieutenant Brewster’s voice was a welcome one, and George stumbled as it wrenched him completely back to the present. “What the – Ben?” 

“Get the doctor,” George commanded him. “Bring him to my tent.” 

“Yes, sir,” Brewster, bless him, was running, the warmth of the fire still alive in his veins. George envied him. 

George lowered Ben gently onto his cot, leaving his side long enough to get rags from his linens to press to Ben’s wounds. The boy’s eyes were still closed. He stared at Ben’s eyelids, willing them to open, demanding them to open. A tear George didn’t realize he was shedding landed gently on Ben’s cheek. He was so pale. 

“General,” the doctor burst through the flap of the tent, Brewster right behind him. “What happened?” 

“Benedict Arnold happened,” George said shortly. “Brewster, with me.” 

He moved away from Ben, trying to keep his eyes from straying to his inert body, and addressed Ben’s best friend. “I need you to do something for me.” 

“Yes, sir.” 

“Arnold –” George allowed himself a moment to collect his emotions. “Arnold threatened –”

“You don’t have to say it, sir,” Brewster said reassuringly. “I already know.” 

George clenched his jaw. So Arnold wasn’t wrong. Everyone in camp already knew. Even so – 

“Know what?” 

Brewster’s cheeks flushed. “I know – I mean, I know that Tallboy over there loves you more than he’s loved anyone before,” he said quietly, careful to make sure the doctor couldn’t hear him. “And as far as I know, you feel the same way.” 

George inhaled. So Benjamin loved him. The thought was comforting, but the comfort was stamped out knowing that Ben might never have the chance to actually say the words himself. 

“Sir,” Brewster prompted him, and George’s eyes settled on the smaller man. “Give me an order.” 

George could see the rage, barely contained in his eyes. He wanted the freedom to bring Arnold to justice, but George couldn’t give him that. Arnold would string him up, and that would break Ben’s heart. 

“Arnold got into my tent in a British uniform,” George said quietly. “He had help. Figure out who it was, and bring them to me.” 

“Sir, yes, sir.” 

“Lieutenant?” 

Brewster stopped at the entrance to the tent, his hand on his pistol. “Sir?” 

“Bring them to me alive.” 

Disappointment clouded Brewster’s features. “Yes, sir.” 

George left the doctor to his work, painfully aware of how he would look, standing over Benjamin while the doctor tried to make sure he would survive. How many other people in camp knew about them? Gilbert surely must know, and Hamilton. But the rest? 

How would this affect his leadership? 

George stood outside his tent, letting the cold seep under his clothes again, punishing himself for bringing this down on Benjamin. George, George had earned this. But Ben was too good, a pure soul, even during wartime. He didn’t deserve what this would mean for him. 

He thought back, again, to that perfect house in Virginia, with the vineyard and the horses, and tried to picture it without Ben. 

The house, imaginary as it was, already felt empty. 

“General Washington?” the doctor’s hand on his shoulder wrenched him back to painful reality, somehow even more painful than the empty house George had always resigned himself to. “He’s awake.” 

George rushed past the doctor, his former standoffish propriety forgotten. Ben was indeed awake, his eyes trained on the ceiling of the tent, his eyes half-lidded. George dropped to his knees beside him, reaching for his hand. He squeezed it gently, relishing in its warmth. 

“Benjamin,” he breathed, and Ben’s eyes jumped to his quickly, the speed startling him. Immediately, George could see the tears gathering in his eyes. “Shh, shh, Benjamin, it’s okay. You’re safe now.” 

“He said he was going to kill you,” Ben’s voice was ragged, and George had to forcibly tear his mind away from where that sound took him – the middle of the woods, Ben screaming for help until his voice gave out and his hope left him. No, he wouldn’t think about that. “I couldn’t get to you.” 

“It’s okay,” George reassured him. “I got to you. You’re safe.” 

“I’m not worried about me,” he said firmly, and the steeliness of his voice forced a cough that shook his body. Ben closed his eyes against the pain it brought, and George tightened his hold on his hand. “What would I do if he killed you?” 

George glanced over his shoulder. The doctor, mercifully, was still outside, opting to give them privacy. He thanked God for that. He leaned over Ben, careful to stay away from the bandages on his arm, and pressed a gentle but firm kiss on his lips. 

“How about we protect each other?” he said quietly against his lips. Ben exhaled his assent, and pressed his lips to George’s once more. 

“Yes, sir.”


End file.
